Author e e a t requirements skill

Author E-E-A-T Requirements

Contents

• Named Author Attribution
• Author Bio Structure
• Author Page Requirements
• Person Schema Properties
• Experience Signal Markers
• Trust Indicators
• September 2025 QRG Key Principle
• E-E-A-T Scoring Rubric
• E-E-A-T Framing by Topic Risk
• E-E-A-T Signals by Content Type

Named Author Attribution

A named accountable author or editor is strongly preferred for every blog post. Organization attribution is acceptable when the organization is the accountable publisher and the page also exposes clear editorial ownership.

Never Use

Attribution	Problem
"Admin"	No person, no trust
"Staff"	Indistinguishable from auto-generated
"Team"	No individual accountability
"Editor"	Not an author signal
No byline	Worst case: page appears authorless

Preferred

• Full real name (first + last)
• Crawlable author or profile page with a stable URL
• Same name used on social profiles linked via sameAs
• One author per post (co-authors acceptable with both named)

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Author Bio Structure

2-3 sentences. The bio establishes E-E-A-T credentials, not a sales pitch.

Formula

Sentence 1: [Name] is a [role/title] with [N years] experience in [domain]. Sentence 2: [Credential, employer, or notable achievement relevant to the topic]. Sentence 3 (optional): [Specific focus area or what they write about].

Good Examples

Sarah Chen is a content strategist with 8 years of experience in B2B SaaS. She's led content programs at HubSpot and Drift, specializing in data-driven blog optimization.

Marcus Rivera is a senior frontend engineer at Vercel. He maintains two open-source React component libraries with 12K+ combined GitHub stars and writes about performance patterns for production applications.

Dr. Elena Vasquez is a clinical psychologist and researcher at Stanford Medical Center. She has published 23 peer-reviewed papers on cognitive behavioral therapy and digital mental health interventions.

Bad Examples (Anti-Patterns)

"John is passionate about helping businesses grow through innovative digital solutions.": Vague, no credentials, sounds like marketing copy.

"Our team of experts delivers world-class content marketing services." : Not a person, promotional, no specific expertise.

"Jane is the CEO of GrowthMax Inc., the leading AI-powered marketing platform.": Sales pitch disguised as bio.

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Author Page Requirements

Every named author should have a crawlable author or profile page. The URL path can follow the site's existing information architecture.

Page Must Include

Element	Details
Full name (H1)	Same name used in bylines
Professional photo	Real photo, not avatar or stock
Extended bio	100-200 words with credentials
Social links	LinkedIn, Twitter/X, personal site, GitHub (as relevant)
Article list	All published posts by this author, newest first
ProfilePage schema	JSON-LD with Person entity

ProfilePage Schema Example

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "ProfilePage",
  "mainEntity": {
    "@type": "Person",
    "@id": "https://example.com/author/sarah-chen#person",
    "name": "Sarah Chen",
    "jobTitle": "Content Strategist",
    "description": "Content strategist with 8 years of experience in B2B SaaS, specializing in data-driven blog optimization.",
    "url": "https://example.com/author/sarah-chen",
    "image": "https://example.com/images/authors/sarah-chen.jpg",
    "sameAs": [
      "https://linkedin.com/in/sarahchen",
      "https://twitter.com/sarahchen",
      "https://sarahchen.com"
    ],
    "worksFor": {
      "@type": "Organization",
      "name": "Example Corp"
    },
    "alumniOf": {
      "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity",
      "name": "UC Berkeley"
    }
  }
}

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Person Schema Properties

The Person schema embedded in BlogPosting and on author pages.

Property	Required	Description	Example
@type	Yes	Always "Person"	"Person"
@id	Yes	Stable URI with fragment	"https://example.com/author/sarah-chen#person"
name	Yes	Full name	"Sarah Chen"
jobTitle	Yes	Current role	"Content Strategist"
url	Yes	Author page URL	"https://example.com/author/sarah-chen"
image	Yes	Headshot URL	"https://example.com/images/authors/sarah-chen.jpg"
sameAs	Yes	Array of social/profile URLs	["https://linkedin.com/in/sarahchen"]
worksFor	Recommended	Organization entity	{"@type": "Organization", "name": "Example Corp"}
alumniOf	Optional	Educational institution	{"@type": "CollegeOrUniversity", "name": "UC Berkeley"}
description	Recommended	Brief professional summary	"B2B SaaS content strategist..."
knowsAbout	Optional	Array of expertise topics	["SEO", "content strategy", "B2B marketing"]

Complete Person JSON-LD

{
  "@type": "Person",
  "@id": "https://example.com/author/sarah-chen#person",
  "name": "Sarah Chen",
  "jobTitle": "Content Strategist",
  "url": "https://example.com/author/sarah-chen",
  "image": "https://example.com/images/authors/sarah-chen.jpg",
  "description": "Content strategist with 8 years of experience in B2B SaaS, specializing in data-driven blog optimization.",
  "sameAs": [
    "https://linkedin.com/in/sarahchen",
    "https://twitter.com/sarahchen",
    "https://sarahchen.com"
  ],
  "worksFor": {
    "@type": "Organization",
    "name": "Example Corp",
    "url": "https://example.com"
  },
  "alumniOf": {
    "@type": "CollegeOrUniversity",
    "name": "UC Berkeley"
  },
  "knowsAbout": ["SEO", "Content Strategy", "B2B SaaS Marketing"]
}

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Experience Signal Markers

Phrases that demonstrate first-hand experience. Use these naturally throughout content to signal genuine expertise to both human readers and quality raters. In AI citation selection, demonstrated Experience is the tie-breaker when two sources are similarly authoritative: original testing, named workflows, direct observations, and proprietary data win over generic summaries.

Use These Patterns

Pattern	When to Use
"When we tested..."	Describing an experiment or A/B test
"In our experience..."	Sharing practitioner insight
"After implementing this for [client]..."	Case study context
"Over the past [N] years, I've found..."	Long-term observation
"Here's what our data shows..."	Introducing proprietary findings
"I've personally seen..."	Direct observation
"We ran this experiment across [N] sites..."	Multi-site testing
"What surprised us was..."	Counterintuitive findings
"The mistake most teams make is..."	Practitioner wisdom
"When I worked at [Company]..."	Named employer context

Signals to AVOID

Anti-Pattern	Problem
"As an expert in..."	Self-proclaimed authority, no evidence
"It is well known that..."	Vague consensus claim
"Studies show..." (no citation)	Unsourced authority claim
"Everyone agrees..."	Unfalsifiable
"Trust us when we say..."	Demands trust rather than earning it
Generic "top tips" language	Could have been written by anyone
No first-person perspective	Reads like encyclopedia, not experience
"In this article, we will..."	Filler, not experience signal

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Trust Indicators

Trust is the most important member of the E-E-A-T family (September 2025 QRG). Trust encompasses and validates all other signals.

Site-Level Trust Signals

Signal	Priority	Implementation
Contact page	Critical	Real email, phone, or contact form
About page	Critical	Company/author info, mission, team
Privacy policy	Critical	Required depending on jurisdiction, tracking, and data collection
Terms of service	High	Legal framework for content use
Editorial policy	High	How content is created, reviewed, updated
Physical address	High (local)	Required for LocalBusiness, helpful for all
Author social profiles	High	Verifiable external presence
HTTPS	Critical	Non-negotiable baseline
Clear ownership	High	Who publishes this site and why

Content-Level Trust Signals

Signal	Implementation
Source attribution	Every claim backed by named source
Transparent methodology	How data was collected, sample size
Conflict of interest disclosure	Affiliate links, sponsorships
Correction/update notes	"Updated [date]: corrected [what]"
Expert review	"Reviewed by [Expert Name], [credentials]"
Date transparency	Publish date AND last updated date visible

Trustworthiness requires the FLOW evidence triple. Experience and authority signals only land when the underlying claims are verifiable: year anchor in prose, inline citation with publisher and title, URL with retrieval date in compact retrieval notes, footnotes, or a bibliography. See flow-alignment.md.

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September 2025 QRG Key Principle

Google's Quality Rater Guidelines (September 11, 2025 revision) remain the current QRG in mid-2026 as of 2026-07-07. That 182-page version renamed "YMYL Society" to "YMYL Government, Civics & Society," added AI Overview evaluation examples, and assigned lowest ratings to value-less auto or AI content.

The E-E-A-T framing is stable. Google's September 2025 revision established:

"Trust is the most important member of the E-E-A-T family because untrustworthy pages have low E-E-A-T no matter how Experienced, Expert, or Authoritative they may seem."

This means a page with brilliant expert content but missing trust signals (no author attribution, no contact info, no source citations) will score low overall. Trust is the foundation; the other three factors build on it.

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E-E-A-T Scoring Rubric

These are internal scoring weights for the claude-blog quality rubric. Google does not publish numeric E-E-A-T weights.

Factor	Internal Weight	Key Signals
Experience	20%	First-hand knowledge, original content, case studies, personal testing, process documentation
Expertise	25%	Credentials, technical depth, accuracy, comprehensiveness, professional background
Authoritativeness	25%	Industry recognition, external citations, backlinks, reputation, speaking/publication history
Trustworthiness	30%	Contact info, transparency, security, source attribution, editorial policy, corrections

Scoring Flow

Trust is evaluated FIRST. If trust is low, the overall E-E-A-T score is capped regardless of how strong the other three signals are.

Trust Assessment → If Low → Cap at "Low E-E-A-T"
                 → If Adequate → Evaluate E + E + A → Combined Score

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E-E-A-T Framing by Topic Risk

Helpful, trustworthy content matters broadly, but evidence expectations scale with topic risk and likely user harm. YMYL topics still carry the highest scrutiny.

• Highest risk: health, finance, legal, safety, elections, civics, and other YMYL topics need strong credentials, sourcing, review, and harm-prevention language.
• Medium risk: technical, business, and product guidance needs first-hand testing, transparent methodology, and current sources.
• Lower risk: hobby and entertainment topics still benefit from experience signals, but they do not need the same proof burden as health or finance.

Practical Impact

A blog post about "best mechanical keyboards" should show first-hand testing and transparent recommendations. A post about "best health insurance plans" needs a much higher bar for credentials, review, sourcing, and legal or financial caveats.

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E-E-A-T Signals by Content Type

Content Type	Experience	Expertise	Authoritativeness	Trustworthiness
Blog Post	Author tested/used what they write about; personal anecdotes	Deep topic knowledge; technical accuracy	Links from other sites; author published elsewhere	Sourced claims; editorial policy; contact page
Product Review	Hands-on testing; original photos/video; owns the product	Technical specs knowledge; comparison framework	Known reviewer; multiple reviews published	Disclosure of affiliates; transparent scoring method
How-To Guide	Author has done the process; screenshots of their work	Step accuracy; edge cases covered; troubleshooting	Recognized practitioner; cited by others	Tested instructions; warnings included; updated dates
News Article	Reporter was present or interviewed sources directly	Subject matter knowledge; context provided	Established publication; editorial oversight	Multiple sources; corrections policy; byline
Opinion/Editorial	Author has relevant professional experience	Informed perspective backed by evidence	Published track record; industry standing	Clearly labeled as opinion; counterpoints acknowledged

Minimum Requirements by Content Type

Content Type	Must Have
Blog Post	Named author, 2+ sourced stats, author bio with credentials
Product Review	Original photos, hands-on testing evidence, disclosure
How-To Guide	Author's own screenshots, tested steps, last-updated date
News Article	Named journalist, 2+ sources, publication editorial policy
Opinion/Editorial	Author credentials for topic, "Opinion" label, evidence